Sweet Caroline's Keeper

by Beverly Barton

  Wolfe swallowed hard. Had his insignificant little gift, pur­chased in London on a whim, actually done so much for the young Caroline?

  "Who gave you the camera?" he asked.

  "Someone very important to me." Caroline sighed. "A man I know only as David. He's been my benefactor since my stepfather died. He knew Preston and has sort of looked out for me for that reason. I have no idea who he is or what he looks like or how old he is. But in my heart, I see him as my knight in shining armor."

  Wolfe watched silently as Caroline placed the camera back in its honored spot. When he glanced at her again, he noticed the tears glistening in her eyes and the slight tremble in her hand. Realization hit him like the blow of a sledgehammer.

  "You're infatuated with this man," he said.

  "Yes, I know. But it's a harmless infatuation. My David has made it abundantly clear that we can never meet."

  My David. She referred to him in the same possessive way he thought of her. My Caroline.

  "What if you could meet him? What would you say? What would you do?" Wolfe asked.

  Would you run into his arms? Would you tell him that you love him?

  "That will never happen," she said. "The only place I'll ever meet my David is in my dreams."

  Chapter 7

  So, you think searching through this old place might turn up a clue?" Roz asked

  "It's worth a try," Caroline said. "Wolfe and I agree it's possible the key fits something other than the doors."

  Wolfe stayed at Caroline's side, constantly alert to the sur­rounding stimuli. Every sound. Every sight, especially things he caught in his peripheral vision. He even took note of the odors, having learned long ago to use all his senses when safeguarding his life and the lives of others. There was no way to know for certain when another strike would be made against Caroline or from what direction a second attempt on her life would come. Everyone was suspect. The postman whistling as he delivered mail across the street. The taxi driver picking up a fare half a block away. The woman plant­ing flowers along her sidewalk two houses up.

  Lyle Jennings came around the side of the house on Shef­field Street, paused and took a deep breath. His freckled face was slightly flushed from having run around the entire yard, back and front.

  "The back door's locked," Lyle said, huffing a bit from exertion. "No windows open or broken and no one in sight out back."

  "Thanks," Wolfe said, then held out his hand for the door key. "Roz, you take Caroline to the end of the porch and stay there until I have the door completely open."

  "Aren't you being overly cautious?" Caroline asked. "What are you expecting—someone to jump out and grab me?"

  "That's a possibility." Wolfe removed his tinted glasses. "But I was thinking more along the lines of an explosive device being triggered when the front door opens."

  Caroline gasped. Roz grabbed her hand and tugged. Lyle ran toward the porch, then bounded up the steps.

  "Come on. Let's do what he says." Lyle came up behind the two women, placing one hand on Caroline's back and the other on Roz's shoulder.

  "Please be careful," Caroline called to Wolfe as Lyle led her and Roz to the far end of the wide front porch.

  Wolfe felt fairly confident that the door was clean, but he wasn't willing to take any chances with Caroline's life. He slipped his glasses, which corrected his slight nearsighted­ness, into the inside pocket of his sport coat, then checked the door thoroughly, inserted the key and unlocked the door. He waited for a couple of minutes, then turned the doorknob. Once the door stood wide open, he motioned to the others. Caroline came to him immediately and they entered the house together.

  "What's the matter, Rev, the tension too much for you?" Roz asked Lyle. "You're as white as a sheet."

  "I suppose I am, but then I have enough sense to realize the danger in this situation," Lyle said. "Of course, you're not the least bit afraid, are you? A wild woman like you, with a tattoo on her leg and holes pierced in various body parts, fives for excitement. Tell me, Ms. Thrill Seeker, if a bomb had exploded just then, would that have given you your kicks for the day?"

  "Oh, bite me, Lyle. You're such an uptight, goodie—"

  Caroline stopped in the foyer, turned around, put her hands on her hips and yelled, "For heaven's sake, will you two give it a rest. If y'all can't get along while we're here, then one of you can go sit in the car."

  "Sorry." Roz breezed past Lyle, her nose upturned as she entered the foyer. "Are you sure that guy—" she hitched her thumb backward in Lyle's direction "—is a blood rela­tive of yours?"

  "If we can proceed—" Wolfe looked from Roz to Lyle, who stood in the open doorway "—then I suggest Caroline and I search down here and in the basement and you two try upstairs and then the attic."

  "Remind me again what we're looking for," Roz said.

  "Anything that requires a key to open," Wolfe told her. "Before we leave, we'll try it on all the doors again, just to be sure, but my guess is that Caroline's key doesn't open a door. I think it's a key to a drawer, a trunk, a box. . . something like that. I had Caroline take several snapshots of the key and we've sent them to Dundee headquarters. If it fits any type of standard lock, our lab should be able to iden­tify some definite possibilities."

  "Let's get with it," Roz said. "I have a hot date tonight, so I need to go home in time to get ready."

  "Who's the unfortunate man?" Lyle asked.

  "Lyle, that wasn't very nice." Caroline frowned, but Wolfe noticed her lips twitching and knew she was on the verge of smiling.

  Roz narrowed her gaze, glanced pensively at Caroline and grimaced. "Well, actually, my date is with Gavin Robbins. Gee, Caroline, I hope you don't mind. I mean, you did say that you weren't going to see him anymore and—"

  Caroline laughed. "You're more than welcome to Gavin. But Roz, honey, I think you could do better. Gavin's a good­looking charmer, but if you get serious about him, he'll break your heart."

  "Amen," Wolfe said under his breath. Caroline certainly had figured out Gavin's true nature without any warnings from a friend. He couldn't help wondering if Roz were half as astute.

  Caroline glared at Wolfe. Had she heard his quiet com­ment?

  "Get serious about him? Not me." Roz stared pointedly at Lyle. "I'm the quintessential good-time girl, just in it for fun."

  "One of these days, you'll have to pay a price for having all that fun," Lyle said.

  Roz made a face at Lyle, then stuck out her tongue. He just rolled his eyes toward the ceiling and headed up the stairs. Before he made it to the landing, Roz caught up with him. Wolfe could hear them mouthing off at each other as they tramped along the upstairs hallway.

  "What is it with those two?" Wolfe asked.

  "They're opposites who don't attract," Caroline said.

  "Or maybe opposites who do attract and are fighting the attraction?"

  "Hmm-mmm. Maybe." She reached out and laid her hand on Wolfe's arm. "You don't like Gavin Robbins, do you? Why? You don't even know him."

  "Sorry about my comment," Wolfe said. "You're right, I don't know him, but I have pretty good instincts when it comes to people, and my gut reaction to Robbins was neg­ative." Wolfe glanced at Caroline's hand resting on his arm. "I'm glad you saw through his gentleman facade."

  Caroline's fingers tightened around Wolfe's arm. Their gazes met and locked. He jerked away from her abruptly, unnerved by the powerful sexual urges she ignited within him. Dammit, man, this isn't just any woman. This is your sweet little Caroline! Ah, but that was the problem—she was his sweet Caroline. But she was no longer a little girl.

  "Where do we start?" she asked, obviously willing to overlook his blatant rudeness.

  "The kitchen, then the laundry room and the pantry," he said. "After that we'll walk from room to room and look for anything that locks with a key."

  Wolfe tried not to think about the past, tried not to remem­ber the only other time he'd been inside this house. One cold December night nearly fifteen y
ears ago. Fresh snow falling. Christmas lights blinking all over town. On his way down the hall that night, he had passed the living room, noticed the decorated tree and the presents stacked high underneath. Preston Shaw had been sitting behind his desk in the study when he looked up and saw Aidan Colbert standing in the doorway. He'd jumped out of the chair and come forward, his expression one of outrage at first, and then when he'd realized the intruder in his home was an executioner sent by the Peacekeepers, fear etched his classic features.

  David wondered how he could now enter that same room. . .with Caroline? He wasn't the man he had been then, not by appearance nor identity. And there was no way Car­oline could know he was the man who had executed Preston Shaw. But God help him, he knew who he really was and what he'd done that night.

  There would be no way to avoid going into Shaw's study. Wolfe knew he had no choice but to walk through the door, Caroline at his side, and confront the demons from his past without letting on to her that anything was wrong. But Car­oline would be forced to relive that night again, too. Perhaps he could persuade her to stay just outside the door while he searched the room. But if she insisted on coming into the room with him, then he would be her protector, her strong shoulder to lean on if she needed one. However, not by word or deed could he dare let on that he was familiar with any of the intimate details concerning what had occurred in that room when a twelve-year-old child had come face-to-face with her stepfather's killer.

  * * *

  "We have one last room on the first floor to check before we head down into the basement," Caroline said. She had deliberately left the study for last, dreading to go in there again. It had been difficult enough when she'd opened up the old house a few weeks ago and forced herself to enter Pres­ton's study for the first time since the night he was murdered. How could she possibly go in there again?

  "If you'd rather not go into the study, you can wait out in the hall where I can see you, while I check for a lock of some kind," Wolfe told her.

  "You know about what happened that night, don't you? Fletcher must have explained to you how his father died."

  "When a Dundee agent takes on a case, the persons in­volved are thoroughly investigated and a dossier put together on them as quickly as possible," Wolfe explained. "I have copies of the police report concerning Mr. Shaw's death, as well as old newspaper clippings. So, yes, I'm aware of the fact that Preston Shaw died in that room." Wolfe glanced up the hall at the open door.

  "Do you have a report on me?" Caroline asked. "If you do, then you know that I had a nervous breakdown that night, after I called the emergency number. I saw the killer. . .was in the room with him. . .but later I couldn't identify him. I was helpless because I was upset and confused. And my memories were fuzzy. A murderer is probably out there now, walking the streets a free man, because I couldn't give the police a good description of him."

  "You can't blame yourself for something you weren't a part of."

  "If what Preston wrote in the letter he hid away in the safe is true, then he wasn't killed by some burglar. He was assassinated because he had information that was dangerous to someone very powerful. Don't you understand—the man who shot Preston was a professional killer. So tell me this, why didn't he kill me, too?"

  Tears pooled in her eyes. That same old unan-swerable question still haunted her. More so now than ever—now that this new evidence had been discovered. She turned away from Wolfe and hurried down the hall toward the study, feel­ing as if somehow she could solve the mystery only in the room where it had begun.

  "Caroline!"

  Wolfe was running after her. She could hear his heavy footsteps, could sense him drawing nearer and nearer. But she couldn't stop, couldn't wait. She raced into the study, halting in the middle of the room, at approximately the same spot where Preston had lain sprawled on the floor. She gazed down at the scuffed, dusty wood and could almost see the bloodstains that had, in reality, been removed years ago. Sud­denly she looked up and saw a large, dark figure near the door. Her heartbeat thundered in her ears. Moisture coated the palms of her hands. Tremors racked her body.

  He was going to kill her. Shoot her the way he had shot Preston. She couldn't escape. And there was no one else in the house she could call for help.

  A child's chilling screams echoed inside Caroline's head. The room began to spin around and around. She desperately wanted to find that poor, pitiful screaming child, but how could she? Her feet seemed glued to the spot and her vision was beginning to blur.

  Wolfe had seen that look on Caroline's face before. The sheer terror. The fear that she was going to die. Salty bile rose in his throat. His stomach knotted painfully. He couldn't bear seeing her this way. Remembering. Reliving that mo­ment when the two of them had gazed into each other's eyes on a snowy winter night so long ago. Over the years, his nightmares had been filled with that ungodly moment when a little girl had thought he was going to kill her. He had gone over that moment in his mind again and again, and each time he had thought about how ironic it was that he, of all people, had put that kind of fear into a child. Aidan Colbert, who had killed his own father to stop him from murdering a child.

  "Caroline." He spoke her name softly. "Don't be afraid. You're not in any danger. No one is going to hurt you."

  He recognized the glazed look in her eyes. How many times had he seen traumatized men and women relive a ter­rifying moment? In her mind, Caroline was twelve again, Preston lay dead on the floor—and Aidan Colbert hovered in the shadows, the deadly weapon still in his hand.

  All color drained from her face. She began swaying, just a fraction, the movement almost indiscernible at first. But he knew the signs. She was on the verge of fainting.

  "Caroline. . . Caroline. . ."

  He rushed forward despite the horror he saw on her face as he approached. She opened her mouth on a silent scream. He suspected that in her mind she was screaming at the top of her lungs. Just as she started to topple over, Wolfe reached out and grabbed her, swooping her into his arms. She lay limp as a dishrag. He carried her out of the study, down the hall and into an area that had once been the living room. There nestled beneath the arched bay windows was a window seat. He walked across the room, sat down with Caroline in his lap and very gently patted her cheek. Her eyelids flut­tered. He patted her face again. Her eyelids opened and closed. She moaned.

  "Caroline?"

  This time when she opened her eyes, she looked straight at Wolfe. "What happened?" she asked.

  "You fainted."

  She lay there in his arms, a delicious weight. Warm and soft. The delicate scent of her flowery perfume permeating the air he breathed. Her silky black hair draped over his arm.

  "Oh, Wolfe, I'm so sorry. . .I was remembering that night and. . ." She bit down on her bottom lip. "It was you."

  "What?'' Fear grabbed him by the throat in a stranglehold. No, it wasn't possible. She couldn't have recognized him as the man who'd shot Preston Shaw because he no longer re­sembled that man.

  "I saw you there in the doorway, didn't I? And I thought. . .oh, God—" She sat straight up and looked at him so sadly. "I thought you were Preston's killer. For just a few seconds I thought I was twelve again and it was that night. I looked up and saw you and thought—" She gasped, then flung her arms around Wolfe and buried her face against his chest.

  He held her securely but without force. Everything within him longed to comfort her, to find a way to put an end to her torment. But could he trust himself to act purely as her bodyguard, as an objective employee whose sole duty was to protect her? There is no rule that says you can't comfort her, is there? he asked himself. It seemed to him that he had spent a lifetime longing to comfort Caroline, wanting to erase the past and give her a happy future. He had sought any and all means to aid her, hoping that in some small way he could atone for what had happened to her—for what his actions had done to her. In photographs and written reports from Ellison, he had watched her grow up, change from a shy, chubby litt
le girl into a beautiful, successful woman. How many times had he watched the videos Ellison had sent him of Caroline's high school and college graduations? He had freeze-framed her face on both videos so many times he had lost count. Exactly when his concern for a child had turned into an obsession with a woman, he wasn't quite sure.

  She mumbled softly, her lips moving against his shirtfront. "Why didn't he kill me?"

  Wolfe slipped his hand between her neck and his chest and cupped her jaw. She allowed him to tilt her chin just enough so that he could see her face. He looked into her eyes, the color of the blue-tinted violets that his mother had grown in pots on her kitchen windowsill. Of its own volition, his thumb tenderly raked across her parted lips.

  She sighed and said his name. "Wolfe?"

  "You won't ever have to come back here again," he said. "I promise."

  "Can you answer my question?" She stared at him plead­ingly. "In your line of work, you must have been confronted by hired killers more than once. Why would a professional hit man let me live? Why didn't he kill me?"

  Because my job was to eliminate a rogue agent who posed a threat to our government, not to harm an innocent child. The explanation swirled around inside his head. The desire to tell her what he was thinking became an overpowering need. Now is not the time for true confessions, he reminded himself. He had joined Peacekeepers, hoping to help others, to save the innocent whenever possible—because he had failed in his efforts to save his own younger brother and his mother from the wrath of a mean drunk. And every day of his life, since he was a boy of thirteen, Aidan Colbert had lived with the knowledge that even though he had taken his father's life, he had acted too late to save the two people dearest to him. If he could have helped his brother, his mother might still be alive, too.

  "I'm not sure why he didn't kill you," Wolfe said, his voice deceptively calm. "If he was a professional, then he'd been sent to do a job. You weren't part of that job. And if you couldn't identify him, he had no reason to kill you, did he?"